[IxDA Discuss] How far have we come?

[Robert Reimann]

To play devil's advocate to the "how far have we really come?"
question the way it was stated: automobiles have had steering wheels
and foot brakes for at least 100 years. Does that mean the UI of
automobiles is somehow insufficient or antiquated? 20 years of keeping
the mouse and keyboard tells me that these are mature input
technologies that probably do the job well enough for most tasks
involving computers.

Ironically, it seems all too common for CHI folks to obsess about the
*technology* of user interfaces (just look at the number of CHI papers
discussing novel input and display methods). Remember when the
hyperbolic tree graph was hailed as the wave of the future for content
navigation?

I'm far more interested in where we have come in understanding our
users, and how we have used that knowledge to improve the behavior and
overall usefulness and desirability of products and systems. Answering
that question usually has little to do with input or output
mechanisms, and everything to do with what behaviors the product has,
and whether these and the information presented to the users match
their mental models, expectations, and desires.

-- 
Robert Reimann
President, IxDA

Manager, User Experience
Bose Corporation
Framingham, MA


On 10/3/06, Chris McLay <chris at eeoh.com.au> wrote:
> [Please voluntarily trim replies to include only relevant quoted material.]
>
> I just had a strange coincidental moment I thought it appropriate to
> share...
>
> I'm re-reading a paper by Michel Beaudouin-Lafon, "Designing
> interaction, not interfaces." 2004 http://doi.acm.org/
> 10.1145/989863.989865
>
> In this paper he basically argues for HCI to become Interaction
> Design (I'm simplifying). He compares the original Macintosh computer
> from 1984 with the current iMac (2003) - despite the massive growth
> in computing capacity, over 3,000 times, and storage capacity, over
> 200,000 times, the basic interaction is still the same after 20
> years– a mouse, a keyboard and a desktop using windows, icons, menus
> and a pointer.
>
> As I'm reading this I see a brochure in my in tray - "25 years of
> CHI. Look how far we have come… Imagine how far we can go." with
> pictures of children golding pictures of a keyboard, a mouse, a
> drawing tablet, and palm-top device with a qwerty keyboard and an
> anthropomorphic robot.
>
> Most of these were cutting edge 20-25 years ago, sure they have
> evolved and improved, but by how much? I don't really want to bag HCI
> or CHI, but it was such a solid comparison / co-incidence it honestly
> made me think how far have we really come?
>
> (or maybe CHI just needs some better marketing?)
>
>
> --
> Chris McLay ...// interaction & visual designer
>
> Email chris at eeoh.com.au
> Web http://www.eeoh.com.au/chris/